Tagged: william henry miller

Where we pick one or maybe several things to check out in Edinburgh during the month of August [disclaimer: in the event of tardiness, don’t be fooled by the headline, it’s today cos we’re picking it today, rather than you should go today]

Two things to start off. Firstly, we’re probably thought of as a Glasgow blog. Predominantly yes, except one of our number now lives in Edinburgh, another has a sibling there and the other, well, they just like being social. Also, what’s with just being tied to one locale? Hell, we’re multi-national here at Elba.

Secondly, we’re just a music blog. Now, that’s a harder one to argue about but we don’t always have our ears buried in our ‘Beats by Dre‘ headphones, nor do we spend numerous hours per day fawning over our record collection (define numerous). No, we are also locked in a constant battle with each other about who will complete their world book challenge on goodreads first, we’ve been known to visit art installations, take photographs, cook and we all have a passion for sports, mostly American ones, oh and one of us likes baseball…

So, in order to slightly dispel the above ‘myths’, we’re plumping for a play as todays pick. Well, maybe more a musical than play, in fact, it’s a lo-fi one at that and it stars a bit of a hero around these parts, Eddie Argos of ‘classic rock titans‘ Art Brut. Yeah, so not much of a departure from what we usually write about, well, we’ve got a month to work on a bit of variety.

‘The Islanders’, as we said, is a lo-fi musical centred on the retelling and reflection of a holiday which Argos, and the shows writer and co-star Amy Mason took in the late 90’s where storytelling and song attempt to make sense of young love, growing up and the Isle of Wight.

To accompany the show you can also get a rather cool Islanders graphic novel and soundtrack, featuring the shows third member, Jim Moray, over on their bandcamp page.

The Islanders is performed daily between the 1st and 25th of August (excl 12th) at 4pm (if you hurry, you can catch today!) in the Underbelly on the Cowgate. Tickets are £10 but there are a couple of 2for1 shows on the 5th and 6th. Tickets can be purchased through the fringe site.

Also, whilst we’re here, the fantastic Pale Imitation Festival that we spoke about last week kicks off tonight at Henry’s. Tonight’s bill features William Henry Miller (psssst, that’s Meursault), Jonnie Common and The Bad Books (another moniker). £5 in at 7pm.

If it wasn’t enough that we’d provided you with some decent looking festivals to check out this summer and that we weren’t already creating a list of the best jugglers, statues and street magicians for you to go and hurl coppers at in Edinburgh this August, then we’re completely spoiling you by telling you about The Pale Imitation Festival, also taking place in Edinburgh between the 1st and 31st of August.

Click above image to enlarge/see more clearly

The phrase ‘stellar line-up’ doesn’t even come close to describing the excellent bit of programming put together by Back Garden Promotions (or Matthew from Song, By Toad, Bart from Eagleowl, Neil from Meursault and Rob St.John). The festival will take place on selected dates throughout the month of August at Henry’s Cellar Bar and all the gigs cost a fiver to get in apart from the Malcolm Middleton, Ian Humberstone and Now Wakes The Sea gig, which is £7. Alternatively, you could just buy a season ticket for £25 and be done with it. I mean, you’ll struggle to find anything better to do in August.

Normally, I’d list a couple of the standouts in the line-up but I’d feel bad, because I’d be omitting so much* so it’s probably best that you get the run down from Song, By Toad who published this handy guide to each artist over on his blog.